Fell stood up and held out his arms. Maggie rose and went into them.
The door opened and a policewoman bearing a tray with tea and biscuits stood for a moment watching the passionately embracing couple. Then she withdrew, still carrying the tray, and quietly closed the door behind her.
¦
In the following days, Fell and Maggie, insulated to a certain extent by love, waited anxiously for news that Gloria Lewis had been found. What if the madwoman came back to exact revenge?
Gloria’s photograph was shown in all the newspapers and on television. Dunwiddy called on them and said he was confident that she would soon be picked up. He was almost fatherly towards them, for neither Fell nor Maggie had claimed any credit for solving the mystery of the train robbery and Dunwiddy was basking in national fame.
Autumn had arrived and the heat of the dandelion summer was only a memory as days of steady rain drummed down.
Fell and Maggie began to plan their wedding day. Maggie wanted to get married in church, although Fell would have preferred a simple ceremony in a registry office. But Maggie felt that being on that bridge just at the time that Fell was in the river had been no coincidence.
Gradually the old living room was being transformed into the country kitchen that Fell wanted. It was after he had spent what he considered a small fortune on a very beautiful antique Welsh dresser that he confided to Maggie that they really should think of going into business after they were married.
Maggie was still very keen on the idea of a bookshop and Fell finally decided it was a good plan. They travelled around, consulting booksellers, reading up on bookshop management, and at last renting a shop in the High Street not far from Melissa’s health shop.
The wedding date was set for the first week in October at St. Peter’s. Fell had engaged the services of an organist. Maggie had pleaded with him to invite his ‘relatives’ and also suggested he should invite old Mrs. Wakeham. It took some persuasion because Fell was still bitter about the circumstances of his birth, but he wanted the wedding to be special for Maggie, so he at last gave in to her requests.
Now they bought all the newspapers and watched television news, hoping to hear that Gloria had been found. Maggie longed to have all the ends tied up before the wedding. Then there were the other two men who had also taken part in the robbery. Rudfern hadn’t known where they were, but surely they would not dare come back to Buss. Interpol was looking for the couple as well as for Gloria.
Then, a week before the wedding, Dunwiddy called. “Good news,” he said.
Maggie’s eyes shone with relief. “You’ve got Gloria!”
“No, not her. But we found out about the other two, Snotty Duggan and Harry Finn. Snotty – real name, George – and Harry are both dead. They moved to Turkey, to the south coast, and then had this idea of getting into the drugs racket to increase their wealth. The local mafia are not fond of interlopers and so the pair of them were murdered, and only two years ago. I had never come across them in their villainous days here, and although their murders got a small paragraph in the newspaper, it didn’t mean anything to me. Rudfern must have known; God knows why he would lie.”
“Maybe it was a news item that passed him by,” said Fell. “I think he would have told us otherwise. I mean, he told us everything else.”
“From what we’ve gathered,” said Dunwiddy, “Rudfern had begun to hate his own daughter. Their cleaning woman said they were constantly quarrelling and having scenes. She now tells us she overheard Rudfern saying, ‘I’ll shop you,’ and Gloria replying, ‘You can’t. I’ll bring you down with me’.”
Maggie shivered. “I don’t like to think of her out there.”
‘Don’t worry,” said the inspector. “There’s one place in the world she won’t dare show her face and that’s Buss!”
? The Skeleton in the Closet ?
Epilogue
MAGGIE and Fell had decided to spend their honeymoon in Paris and then begin work on the bookshop as soon as they got back.
Fell had asked his ‘cousin’ Tom to be best man. He had finally agreed with Maggie that to have some pretend relatives was better than having none at all. Mrs. Moule, complete with Zimmer frame, was to be Maggie’s maid of honour. Maggie had invited her mother and could only hope that she would not get drunk at the reception, which was to be held at the Palace Hotel.
Maggie studied her wedding outfit. It was a green silk suit. She had been watching her diet so that there would be no danger of it straining at the seams when she went to the church in the morning.
As she came down from the bedroom, she heard the doorbell ring. Fell was out in the garden. He called, “Will you get that, Maggie?”
Fell had put his ‘relatives’ up at the Palace Hotel, but Maggie thought one of them might be calling round. And so it turned out. Aunt Agnes stood on the step. “I thought I’d bring your wedding present round,” she said. “You’ll want to take it on your honeymoon.”
“Come in,” said Maggie as Fell came in from the garden. “Aunt Agnes has brought us a present,” said Maggie.
“What on earth have you done here?” demanded Aunt Agnes, looking round at the new kitchen. “What on earth do you need a big kitchen like this for?”
Fell sighed. “It suits us.”
“It looks odd to me.”
“Mind if we open your present?” Fell wanted to stop any more criticism.
He unwrapped the paper. Revealed were two pink hot-water bottles in the shape of fuzzy teddy bears.
“How sweet,” said Maggie quickly, as a look of horror crossed Fell’s face.
“It’ll be a hard winter, mark my words,” said Aunt Agnes, “and you’ll need to keep warm on your honeymoon.”
Maggie began to giggle helplessly. “I don’t see what’s so funny,” said Aunt Agnes, bridling. “I took my hot- water bottle on my honeymoon and I was glad of it.”
Fell began to laugh as well and then Maggie said in a choked voice, “That’s the doorbell. I’ll get it.”
Still laughing, she opened the door. A thin man stood there, a baseball cap pulled down over his eyes. “Come to read the meter,” he said.
“Could I see some identification?” asked Maggie.
He thrust his hand into his pocket and pulled out a small pistol. “Get inside,” he ordered.
White-faced, Maggie backed into the house.
The ‘man’ dragged his baseball cap off his head, revealing the hard features and glittering eyes of Gloria Lewis.
In the kitchen, Fell and Aunt Agnes stared, astonished.
“You!” said Fell. He made a move towards the phone.
“Stay where you are,” snarled Gloria.
“What do you want?” demanded Fell.
“I want you dead, you interfering bastard. My father would be alive today if it weren’t for you. I’m tired of running.”
“Look,” said Fell. “The police only want you as an accessory to the robbery. You kill me and it’s murder. As it stands at the moment, a good lawyer could get you off.”
“No, he couldn’t. This is Britain, and you get a longer jail sentence for robbery than you do for murder. You’re for it.”
Her eyes glittered madly, but the hand holding the gun never wavered.
“Ho, just you wait a minute,” cried Aunt Agnes. “Nobody’s going to shoot my nephew.”
A small figure in a tightly buttoned-up tweed coat, she placed herself in front of Fell.
“Get out of the way!” raged Gloria.
